A Peculiar Visitor
by ClassifiedAndTopSecret
Summary: A new penguin is dropped in the team's exhibit and there is more to this penguin than meets the eye. Perhaps not the most original of ideas, but I'm putting my own spin on it because the other such stories didn't quite satisfy my extremely picky tastes. Rated for safety and possible topics in later chapters.
1. Chapter 1

Alice had just finished a long day of work and locked up her office, feeling safe in the belief that no one would tamper with her things. However, no sooner than she had left the building four penguins burst into her office.

"Rico, keep an eye out for any night-time marauders," Skipper ordered.

"On it!" Rico settled himself by the door.

"Remind me, Kowalski: what exactly are we looking for?" Skipper jumped up onto the desk.

"Alice's new scientific calculator. She was seen sneaking the contraband in earlier this afternoon." Kowalski began checking the drawers.

"Really? We're missing Shirtless Ninja Fighting for _that_?"

"Well, if a certain _someone_ hadn't destroyed my first calculator, then perhaps I wouldn't need a new one!" Kowalski looked pointedly at Rico.

"What you lookin' at me for?" Rico said, clearly unremorseful. Kowalski fumed.

"Um, is this important, do you think?" Private removed a sheet of paper from the printing tray and brought it over to the others.

"Alice must have forgotten to file it." Kowalski took it from Private and examined the picture.

"Alice forgets to file things all the time. So?" Skipper couldn't see why it mattered.

"Skipper, I may be mistaken, but I think that it's bad news."

"They're bringing back the spy camera system?" Skipper exclaimed in dismay.

"What? No, not that," Kowalski negated his leader's theory.

"Then what?"

"It would appear that our zoo overlords have seen fit to add another penguin to our exhibit."

"A zoo transfer?" Skipper exploded. "Into _our_ habitat?"

"That is what the computer says," Kowalski said apologetically.

"How will we be able to execute missions with a spy watching our every move?" Skipper demanded, tapping the penguin-shaped icon that indicated the imminent transfer.

"He might not be a spy at all," Private said, ever the optimist. "What if he's a civilian?"

"That's even worse! A spy would only report their intel to whatever villain they answer to. A civilian would blab about our business to the whole world!" Skipper gesticulated wildly. "Kowalski! Explain to the private why a civilian might be worse than a spy."

"The new arrival could tell the zoo about our ongoing operations and consequently give any malcontents the information needed to plan an ambush. That scenario also completely ignores the prevalence of social networking sites and the possibility that an outsider may well reveal our HQ's position to the millions who use such sites."

"That doesn't sound good at all." Private touched the tips of his flippers together in concern. "What are we going to do?"

"Kaboom?" Rico asked eagerly.

"I don't know," Skipper sighed.

"Skipper, surely not! Alice would be certain to notice!" Kowalski was galvanised.

"And we can't go blowing other penguins up," Private added.

"Hmm, you might be onto something. Rico, we'll keep your idea as Plan B. Kowalski, options for Plan A!"

"We could transfer them out of the zoo," Kowalski suggested.

"Wouldn't that mean that they'd have to get into the zoo first?" Private asked.

"I think that we can handle containment duty for a few hours," Skipper said.

"Alice coming!" Rico said. Approaching footsteps could be heard – the cleaning staff coming in to go over the building. Speculation about the new arrival was put on hold.

"Roll out men!" Skipper commanded.

"And I'm back to the abacus," Kowalski sighed and he followed his three teammates out.

**The first chapter of my first fanfiction! ****I must admit that I'm a little excited about it. **I know that my story's topic is not exactly a new one, but it won't do any harm to put my own spin on that old classic. If there are any grammar/spelling mistakes, please let me know! Feedback is also much appreciated.


	2. Chapter 2

As it turned out, the penguins missed no more than the beginning of their program. Even Kowalski had stayed out of his lab and was watching avidly with Skipper and Rico. Private was the only one who was less than delighted. He didn't really understand the glee with which his teammates watched such violence. He wasn't one to judge though, and so he sat quietly on the sidelines instead. He would generally amuse himself with thoughts of Lunacorns and quilting, but this time his mind kept wandering back to the new penguin.

Skipper's suspicions were pretty much always proved right. Private knew that. In every instance he could remember, Skipper's paranoia had correct – Rhonda, the Hoboken Zoo, Hans and more. '_Mind you, there was the Skorca too. I was right about that,' _Private thought, brightening at the memory. _'Maybe having a new penguin would be fun – maybe he'll even like the Lunacorns!'_

The others were less hopeful. Kowalski and Rico were more or less indifferent. Skipper was even more eager than Private for the new penguin to arrive, but that was because the sooner the penguin came, the sooner he could be transferred away.

Skipper was the first up in the morning. The sun rose too slowly for his taste, gradually dragging lilac and apricot into the sky before finally following it up with daytime blue. Despite his impatience, he passed the time by drinking his usual cup of joe and only woke his men up at six hundred hours.

"Up and at 'em, boys! Looks like today will be the day that we see off that spy." Skipper finished off his fish coffee. "Get yourselves topside in ten minutes for the daily drills. We may not be able to train while we have an uninvited guest breathing down our necks so we've got to make the most of the time we have till then."

The penguins began flopping out of bed and going up to their exhibit. In the next few hours till opening time, they went through the most rigorous exercising that they had done since the last Team Building Week. Opening time was received with great relief – after the incident when they had been filmed practice fighting, they refrained from such activities when humans were watching. Skipper briefed the others while they went through their smile and wave routine.

"From here onwards, today is officially a hobby day," Skipper announced amid the cheers of his team. As they quietened down, he continued, "Unofficially, however, we are ready to leap into action as the moment requires it. If our cover is blown, the obvious course of action is to restrain the spy and use either the amnesia gas or else the brainwashing machine."

"What are we going to do if our cover remains intact?" Kowalski asked.

"We're going to try dealing with this intruder by not letting him know that he's intruding. We'll go about our business as usual, minus the commando stuff. Private – I never thought these words would come out of my mouth – I am ordering you to watch the Lunacorns."

"Yay! Can I make quilts too?" Private was overjoyed.

"Sure, knock yourself out. Rico, go easy on the explosives." Skipper felt bad about that order and, upon seeing Rico's disappointment, suggested, "Why not spend the day with Miss Perky instead?"

Rico cheered up. Skipper turned to the last team member.

"Kowalski, feel free to invent things, but keep away from the top secret stuff. You might want to try repairing that mindreading machine you used to have."

"The Psychotron?" Kowalski said helpfully.

"That's the one. You never know when it'll be useful. Now let's get started on adorable hijinks-"

"Skipper?" Private asked.

"What is it, Private? You're not calling in sick on adorable hijink duty, are you?"

"No, it's just that you haven't mentioned what you're going to be doing."

"That's because I don't feel the need to give orders to myself out loud. Ringtail does enough of that for the whole zoo. Commence adorable hijinks!"

With Private appeased, the penguins made the humans coo over them for well over an hour. Fish after fish (and the occasional sneaky hand of popcorn) was thrown to the penguins. Meanwhile, Skipper thought seriously about what he was going to do. He hadn't really noticed before how much of his life went into being a commando – well, it had always felt natural. What could he possibly do in front of a spy?

He could… put together a ship-in-a-bottle! That should use up the time. _'Problem solved,'_ he thought triumphantly.

All that remained now was for Alice to drop the transfer box into their habitat.

**I'm sorry that nothing much happened in this chapter - I got carried away and ran out of time. It's a lot harder to keep them in character than I would have thought. In any case, I can promise that the next chapter will bring in the new character.**** Thank you to XxPenguinSoldierxX for reviewing! And once again, ****constructive criticism and ****spelling/grammar** corrections are much appreciated!


	3. Chapter 3

"Are you sure you read that picture right, Kowalski?" Skipper asked. They'd eaten breakfast, entertained the humans and finished eating the prizes from that too without any sign of a new penguin.

"Of course I'm sure!" Kowalski said indignantly. "Well, ninety percent sure."

As the clock approached twelve, a green lorry parked in front of the zoo storage room. Alice and another zoo employee removed a wooden box from the cargo. They carried the box to the middle of the zoo, comically crashing into every lamppost on the way.

Just as they deposited the box in the penguin exhibit, Alice's walkie-talkie buzzed. She answered it, turning her back on the penguins. The guy who had helped her shrugged and left.

"See!" Kowalski crowed. "I was right after all!"

"The box is rather large... Could you have gotten the animal wrong?" Private asked tentatively.

"Now what is the likelihood of that?" Kowalski made a dismissive noise.

"Look at the evidence, man! That box is taller than you are!" Skipper shouted.

"Not by much," Kowalski grumbled – but his jubilance had vanished. The logical impossibility of it being a leopard seal was small comfort in the face of the horrible images running through everyone's minds.

"So who's opening it?" Skipper said.

"Shouldn't we check that it's safe to do so first?" Kowalski said.

"Good idea, Kowalski," said Skipper. "Any volunteers?"

They all looked at Private, who gulped.

A few moments later, he was edging reluctantly closer to the box.

"H-h-hello?" he called falteringly (and very, very quietly.) He gingerly placed his flipper on the wood and peered in through a small hole.

The first thing he noticed was how huge the animal inside was. The second was how small. It must have curled up in the corner at one point, but now it was lying limp, crumpled and utterly wretched.

"Skipper!" Private jumped away from the box and the pitiful sight within. "I think it's dead!"

"Dead?" Skipper's face changed from suspicious to concerned.

"It?" Kowalski sounded somewhat panicked. One never knew when Private would empathise with a leopard seal, especially after the incident with Hunter.

Rico, never one for idle chatter, hacked up a chainsaw and had the front panel of the box off in no time. The penguins could only stare at the sight that greeted them.

It was indeed a penguin, but one that was larger than any of them. It was not black, but a light fawn colour. And it was very much alive. Standing foremost in the box, it had been placidly waiting to be let out. In fact, it looked so well-settled in its place that it was almost unimaginable that it had ever done anything else.

"Thank you," it said shortly after a minute's delay. The words seemed disconnected from the actions that had prompted them. The voice that said them gave away only slightly more. The new penguin was a she, and an upper-class British she at that. Her voice revealed nothing more, not even nervousness.

Eventually, the four penguins snapped out of it and became embarrassed at having stared for so long. Skipper felt irrationally annoyed with this intruder for wrong-footing him.

"Names please?" she asked after waiting a second minute. Her brusque but seemingly genuine politeness was very odd.

Kowalski looked to Skipper for introductions, but the leader was still fixing the new penguin with the most suspicious gaze he could manage. Kowalski sighed and began naming his friends.

"I'm Kowalski, that's Rico-" He barely managed his own name before Skipper spoke across him.

"Your name first." Skipper made it a challenge.

"Liz," she answered, coming up with the alias on the spot. She pointed now as she named each penguin. "So he's Kowalski, he's Rico and you are..."

'_Kid's game,' _Skipper scoffed internally, confident in the knowledge that she'd guess wrong.

"Johnson and he's Manfredi?" she suggested.

"How do you know about Manfredi and Johnson?" Skipper seized her by her collar feathers, barely just able to reach without standing on tiptoe.

"A friend mentioned them." She was startled but unfazed.

"And who would this _friend_ happen to be? Hans? Doctor Blowhole?" Skipper shook her vigorously.

"I'm not familiar with those names. Could you let go of me please?" She tried to pull away, but he was dragged after her. Then she chopped him neatly across his flippers.

That was it. Skipper subconsciously labelled her a threat and flew at her. It was hardly enough to be called a fight; a few seconds of tussling was all it was. It finished with Liz lying on her front and Skipper pinning her flippers, although he had to sit on her to hold her down.

"Alright, you win," she said quickly, realising how long it would take him to tire of fighting. "I surrender. Now kindly release me. Quite frankly, you're beginning to frighten me."

"Well, that's the whole point-" he began to laugh, and brought her to the end of her patience. She rolled over, crushing him with all her might, and then slid away to the opposite end of the concrete island as he twitched on the ground.

She preened herself briefly, smoothing out her feathers again, and then said, "I'm very sorry for squashing you, but you seemed to lack the inclination to restrain yourself. Now if you really feel the need, you can interrogate me like a civilised penguin would, but no funny business."

Skipper's only response was to gasp in an attempt to reinflate his lungs.

**I hope this chapter isn't too bad. I should have worked on it some more, but I didn't want to keep it back for another day. I'm sorry if you wanted to see more in it, but I've only had very little time to write over the last two days and even this was squeezed in between the different events. Thank you to EppogirlXD and XxPenguinSoldierxX for reviewing!**


	4. Chapter 4

It took a while, but eventually Skipper decompressed himself and all five of the penguins went downstairs into what they would normally call their HQ, although not when Liz was within earshot.

"Skipper, was blowing cover really wise?" Kowalski said out of the corner of his mouth as they descended the ladder. Liz and Private had gone first, so he was hoping that the latter would keep the former distracted.

"That wasn't blowing cover!" Skipper protested, searching for an upside. "That was, uh..."

"Blew it," Rico said cheerfully. He didn't really have an opinion on the new penguin, but was hoping for some excitement.

"At any rate, she thinks that you're criminally insane. Not sure what she thinks about the rest of us." Kowalski was last off the ladder.

"Well, if you do it right, we can play this off as a good cop bad cop situation. Except that we shouldn't let her know about it," Skipper added.

"Are we trying to find something out from her?" Kowalski hadn't expected the reference to Manfredi and Johnson from a stranger, but he didn't think it warranted this amount of paranoia.

"Of course we are! We need to find out how much she knows about us," Skipper said, slightly louder than he intended. They guiltily looked over their shoulders.

Private and Liz were engaged in conversation – not something that would be particularly surprising, given Private's friendly nature, except that it appeared to be about Lunacorns.

"You're kidding me," Rico said in astonishment.

"What?" Private saw their expressions and held his Lunacorn closer. "She said that she liked Lunacorns."

"I said that I used to," Liz corrected, though not unkindly. "I'm just curious about what sort of games other people play with them."

"Why, what did you play?" Private asked.

"Probably had pretend parties with all the little plastic ponies." Skipper rolled his eyes and started to get a boat-in-a-bottle kit out.

"No, even though that's what Bree always wanted." Too late Liz realised that she had let slip a name that she would not have wanted to mention. Nevertheless, she continued seamlessly. "I liked wars and revolutions and sometimes plain old brawls, so that's what we did."

Private looked horrified at the last part. Skipper was the one who picked up on the name.

"Who's Bree?"

"My little sister. She and I were separated a while ago." Liz's voice had taken on the same empty quality that it had had at the beginning.

"Oh. I'm sorry," Private said awkwardly.

"It was a long time ago." She brightened her voice very carefully as she continued. "You were saying something about the Lunacorns?"

While Private went on to explain to her the virtues of fluffing each tail strand of a Lunacorn separately instead of simply brushing, the other three penguins huddled together once more.

"We're not transferring her out yet, not until we discover exactly who she is and what she knows. She's lying about something," Skipper said.

"An extended stay does not seem likely to encourage her to reveal any secrets that she may or may not have." Kowalski was a little more realistic.

"That's why you're going to fix your mind-reading machine. You don't have any truth serum left, do you?" Skipper remembered the red liquid that had been kept in a hot sauce bottle previously.

"No, Private consumed all of it. I could prepare a new batch though," Kowalski suggested.

"Then do that. And find out why she's not black. It's kind of spooky to see a beige and white penguin around all the time."

"On it, Skipper." Kowalski was off to the lab. Skipper dismissed Rico too and they went about their different hobbies. None of them noticed that Liz had stopped chatting with Private a while ago and had instead been sitting silently in a corner, lost in memories.

**Liz is certainly a very secretive lady. The tip of the iceberg has finally been sighted; the real question is when we'll find out how big it really is. Feel free to make guesses about her past in the reviews! Speaking of which, thank you to Bml1997, EppogirlXD and SkipperPrivate for reviewing! However, please don't feel the need to be kind unnecessarily; if you notice any mistakes or think that something should be changed, constructive criticism is welcomed as enthusiastically as praise (well, almost as enthusiastically.)**


	5. Chapter 5

Despite giving the impression that he would research Liz's abnormal colouring first, Kowalski had set about repairing the Psychotron before anything else. He checked it over and made sure that it was only the chip that needed replacing. That would have to be retrieved separately, however, and he put that aside for when he was sure that he had a complete shopping list. He had all of the chemicals necessary for manufacturing truth serum, so that came next. He was halfway through the process when he heard someone knock on the door.

"Come in," he called without thinking that there was only one penguin that would feel the need to knock.

"It's me, Liz." She closed the door behind herself.

Kowalski whipped around, looking plainly guilty_. 'What if she notices the truth serum?'_ he thought in panic. Then, _'Get a hold of yourself; this is a particularly explosive situation.'_

"I can see that it's you," he said, stalling to get a few moments in which to compose himself. "What brings you into my lair?"

"Lair?" She looked at him quizzically.

"Lab, I mean lab." He slapped himself mentally. He and she accidentally spoke at the same time.

"The question still stands-"

"I came because- sorry," Liz apologised awkwardly. "You first."

"I pretty much finished what I was saying, actually." Kowalski was equally clumsy. "So… why did you come in here?"

"I was wondering if you had any books."

"Books? What for?" Kowalski frowned.

"To read," Liz said as it was obvious. "I especially enjoy Jules Verne's and H.G. Wells' works, but that would be too much to hope for."

The last part of the sentence sailed over Kowalski's head. "You can _read_?"

"Of course! Why, are girls not supposed to be literate?" Liz laughed.

"No, it's just that penguins can't usually read," Kowalski said blankly.

Liz changed the subject. "What exactly are you brewing?"

"I wouldn't use the word 'brewing'. It's not some sort of potion." It was Kowalski's turn to avoid a subject.

"Is it some sort of volatile thioether?" She used the up-to-date name for a sulphide.

"No," he said, puzzled. "Why would it be?"

"Volatile thioethers are renowned for the same rotten egg smell that is currently permeating this room. You might want to check on that mixture."

Kowalski emitted a high-pitched squeal of dismay and rushed over to remove it from the burner.

"Great, now I have to start all over again." He threw his flippers up.

"I'm so sorry," she said helplessly. "Look, why don't you let me do it? I'm sure I could manage it."

"Please, I have a lifetime of science behind me and I still can't always get it right." Kowalski brushed the idea off, carefully concealing his growing uneasiness about having her in such close proximity to something that should have been top secret.

"Is there anything I can do to make up for it?"

"As it happens, yes." An idea had struck Kowalski. "An answer to a question would be very useful.

"You only have to ask."

"How come you're a sort of cream colour rather than black?"

"That!" She chuckled and crossed her flippers. "Isabellism, sometimes called leucism. An exceedingly rare genetic condition that causes a reduction in an organism's overall pigmentation. Not to be confused with albinism, a similar condition that causes a more or less complete lack of pigmentation."

"Oh," Kowalski said, stretching the syllable out to last the duration of the light bulb moment.

"'Oh' indeed. It's rather unfortunate, but it can't be helped." She sighed.

"Is it all that bad? It suits you quite well." Kowalski did his best to sound factual rather than flattering.

"You're very kind to say so, but I didn't say that it was ugly, merely that it is inconvenient. Anyway, while you're being so kind, I don't suppose that you have any spare pencils?"

"What do you need one for?" He began rifling through a plastic box that he kept on a shelf.

"I need to write," she said simply.

"How come? Aha!" His extra pencils had been hiding at the bottom. Typical.

"My need to write borders on pathological. I was born a writer and it is something else that can't be helped, no matter how much I want to be a scientist."

"You want to be a scientist?" Kowalski was taken aback. He offered the pencil to her.

"It is an admirable field and one that I have great personal respect and, dare I say it, fondness for." She took the writing implement. "Thank you very much."

"Why aren't you able to be a scientist? I haven't heard you expound upon the laws of science, but you know what volatile thioethers are and that's definitely not a bad start."

"Because it a place in a community as well as a profession. Perhaps some perceive being a writer as such, but that is not the sort of writer that I am."

"What sort are you, then?" Kowalski doubted that her answer would be entirely honest, but maybe something could be gleaned from it.

"I am distracting you. Thank you for the pencil." She turned to leave.

"You don't even have a notebook!" He couldn't believe that she'd go on like that and then drop the topic.

"Yes, I do!" She pulled one out from the thin air behind herself in a similar way to how Kowalski would usually do. It was a leather-bound journal and exactly the place where a female might spill her secrets without even needing truth serum. She left the lab, the door swinging shut with a heavy thud.

He looked down at the congealed lump that was supposed to be liquid truth-serum-in-the-making and decided that journal extraction would be the better option.

**Did anyone here know about isabellism before this chapter, or have I found another very obscure scientific anomaly? SkipperPrivate, Bml1997 and XxPenguinSoldier, your reviews are extremely gratifying. I still can't believe that there are no complaints, but if you insist. :D**


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